Current Affairs Quiz - February, 2020

Notes:
As per the recent order issued by the Ministry of Personnel, Public Grievances and Pensions, the Appointments Committee of the Cabinet has approved the appointment of M. Ajit Kumar as the next Chairman of Central Board of Indirect Taxes and Customs (CBIC).
The announcement has been made just two days ahead of the Union Budget, which is to be presented on 1st February 2020. M. Ajit Kumar is a 1984-batch Indian Revenue Service Officer, who is presently a member of CBIC. Pranab Kumar Das was the previous Chairman of CBIC.

Notes:
The state government of Punjab recently declared to ban all types of online lottery schemes in the state. The ban of lottery schemes has been made under the Lotteries (Regulation) Act 1998.
This step is expected to curb illegal lottery business in the state and to boost the tax and non-tax revenue of the state government. The Cabinet also approved to prohibit the sale of online lotteries, operated through vending machines and online scheme tickets, promoted by other states.

Notes:
Indian ace Basketball player and Captain, P Mathew Satya Babu recently passed away at 79 years in Chennai. He had represented India in the three Asian Basketball Championships conducted in Seoul, Bangkok and Manila from 1967 to 1970. He also served as the captain of the Indian team during the 6th Bangkok Asian Games.
Mathew Satya Babu was a qualified basketball coach and a referee. He had coached the state basketball team of Tamil Nadu and the men and women teams of Indian Railways.

Notes:
The Artificial Intelligence (AI) department of the global tech-giant Google has recently developed a new model to protect the endangered species of killer whales.
The whales, which are also known as orcas are seen in very few numbers in the Salish Sea. Google has partnered with Fisheries and Oceans Canada to monitor their condition and alert experts in the event of sickness or accidents caused to the whales. The trained AI model uses underwater audio and labels to listen to the sounds of the whale and to display its location.

Notes:
Veteran Indian diplomat Gopal Baglay was recently appointed as the India’s High Commissioner to Sri Lanka. Gopal Baglay, who is currently serving at the Prime Minister’s Office, is expected to assume charge in a short time.
He has succeeded Taranjit Singh Sandhu, who has recently been appointed as the Indian Ambassador to the United States. Gopal Baglay is a 1992-batch officer of the Indian Foreign Service and has held several important positions during his career. He has served as the Deputy High Commissioner of India to Pakistan and Spokesperson of the External Affairs Ministry.

Notes:
Pakistan has recently witnessed its worst locust attack ever in decades and has declared national emergency for tackling their attack. The insects are reported to have destroyed crops on a large scale in Punjab, the main agricultural region of the country. The swarms of locust are currently found on the Pakistan-India border along Cholistan.
The decision to declare national emergency was taken at a meeting convened by Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan. A National Action Plan (NAP) was also approved, which requires a sum of ₹7.3 billion to tackle the crisis. Somalia has also declared national emergency for the same reason, recently.

Notes:
The Chief Minister of Andhra Pradesh, YS Jagan Mohan Reddy had proposed the door-delivery of pension in the state under YSR Pension Kanuka scheme. The process was recently commenced in the state.
The pension has also been increased to ₹2,250 from the earlier ₹1,000 and the eligibility criteria has been revised to provide pension benefit to all the deserved people. The volunteers, with the smartphones containing biometric information of the pensioners will visit the beneficiaries and process the pension payment.

Notes:
The World Wetlands Day is observed annually on February 2 across the world. On 2 February 1971, the Convention on Wetlands was adopted in the Iranian city of Ramsar. From then, the day has been observed annually on the same date.
The theme of this year’s World Wetlands Day is “Wetlands and Biodiversity”. Recently, 10 more wetlands of India are included in the ‘Ramsar site’ list. With this, India has 37 Ramsar sites totally, which cover more than 1 million hectares of area in the country.

Notes:
Delhi Transport Corporation (DTC), the public transporter of Delhi, has been conferred with the Road Safety Award 2018-19 in the urban category for the lowest rate of accidents.
The Director of DTC received the award from the Union Road Transport and Highways, Nitin Gadkari. The award was presented during the 3rd Edition of International Conference and Exhibition on Public Transport Innovation (ICEPTI) 2020, which was organised at New Delhi. The award carries a trophy and a cheque of Rs. 1 Lakh.

Notes:
The Union Cabinet recently approved the Indian Institutes of Information Technology (IIITs) Laws (Amendment) Bill, 2020, to confer the status of Institution of National Importance (INI) to five Indian Institutes of Information Technology (IIITs).
The Five IIITs in Public-Private-Partnership mode at Surat, Bhopal, Bhagalpur, Agartala and Raichur are to conferred with the INI status. After the status has been granted, the institutions would be able to award degrees and to use the nomenclature of Bachelor of Technology (BTech) or Master of Technology (MTech) or PhD degree. The existing 15 IIITs had already been provided with the INI status.